by Evelyn Glass
“No, no.” I shook my head. “But she wants to pop around for an hour and do one last inspection. Put this to rest once and for all.”
“Okay,” he said, visibly relaxing. “When?”
“She was hoping to do it today.” I pulled a face. “I know it’s short notice, but—”
“That sounds fine. Tell her whenever she wants to come around, she can.”
“Oh, cool.” I reached for my phone. “Can I give her a call? I’ll get it set up now.”
“Go ahead.” He waved his hand in my direction, and it seemed as though he was pretty distracted. I wondered if he was worried about another inspection getting carried out, or just pissed that this seemed to keep happening to him. I knew that if I was him, I would be firmly in the latter category.
I called Amanda and told her that she could come around whenever she wanted—she agreed to pop over as soon as she could, and climbed in her car as we finished up the call. I returned to my coffee, and found Jazz still staring off into space as through he couldn’t shake a particular set of thoughts from his brain.
“You okay?” I asked gently, and he snapped out of it, turning to me and smiling broadly. God, that smile—it was one of the finest sights I’d ever laid eyes on, his eyes crinkling happily as his face transformed. I couldn’t help but smile back, almost on instinct.
“I’m good. Just tired. I haven’t been out like that in a while, you know?”
I nodded knowingly, as if I had a clue what he was talking about. I mean, I didn’t know what he was up to. Maybe he was talking about a date? Not a very successful one if he ended up back here, the nasty part of my brain added, and I did my best to ignore it.
“Yeah, of course,” I agreed. “It must be odd for you being away from Ella, too.”
“It really is,” he sighed. “I miss her so much, even when I’m just away for a few hours, you know?”
“I can only imagine.” I held my hands up. “I don’t have any kids of my own.”
“And yet you work with them for a living,” he remarked, with his head cocked to the side.
“Well, I love them.” I shrugged. “Especially when they’re as adorable as your daughter.”
He glanced up the stairs, towards her room, and smiled fondly. “Yeah, she is a perfect little thing, isn’t she? Was she good last night? I know she can be kinda full-on when she meets new people…”
“She was lovely,” I replied firmly. “Very sweet. And creative! She’s got an amazing imagination for a kid her age.”
“I love that about her,” he said, grinning. “My mom always made me think up my own stories and come up with my own characters. I think it’s good for a kid of her age not to just have everything pushed on her by movies and TV, you know?”
He took a sip of his coffee, and we sat in companionable silence for a couple of moments, and I had to admit—I found this guy really impressive as a father. Yeah, maybe he was hiding something—I was sure Amanda would sniff it out, whatever it was—but he obviously adored his daughter so much; it was a pleasure to hear him talk about her. I wondered where her mom was, or if she was on the scene at all—they had obviously split up, but how much out of Ella’s life was she? Dammit, I was letting my weird attraction to hot men who were good with kids get in the way of what I was meant to be doing, which was scouting out if there was anything going on in this house.
Before either of us had a chance to speak again, there came a little patter of footsteps from the stairs. Both of us turned, and grinned as we saw Ella making her way towards us.
“Hey, honey,” Jazz greeted her, and she hurried over to him to give him a hug. She buried her face in his stomach and squeezed tight.
“I missed you, Baddy,” she mumbled into him, and he hugged her back.
“I missed you too,” he affirmed, glancing up at me and raising his eyebrows playfully. He scooped her up into his arms and planted her down on the table so she was at the same height as the rest of us.
“How was your night?” he asked, but before she could answer, the doorbell rang.
“You want me to get it?” I suggested, and he nodded.
“If you wouldn’t mind?”
I went to open the door, and found myself face-to-face with Amanda. She cocked a brow at me, obviously amused by my apparent domesticity.
“Don’t say anything,” I warned her, wagging a playful finger at her. She held her hands up and made her way into the house.
“You must be Jazz.” She marched over to him, holding out her hand.
He got to his feet and took it. “Yeah, that’s me. Feel free to go ahead with the inspection. If there’s anything you need me to do, just let me know.”
“Thank you.” She glanced down at her clipboard. “I’ll just go ahead and get started, then?”
Jazz spread his hands wide. “Anything you need.”
It was an hour-long inspection, the kind that takes place just so the inspector can get a feel for what kind of life these people might be leading. When you brought out someone like Amanda, you could be sure that you were going to get the whole story—she’d been doing this long enough to know what was a put-on and what was reality. I could never read her face, but I was pretty sure it was going well. After the hour had passed, Amanda took Jazz aside and asked if she could speak to him alone for a few minutes. He nodded, and hustled Ella off to watch TV while we spoke.
“Well, first off, I don’t see anything wrong with the household you’re raising your daughter in,” she affirmed, and I could see Jazz visibly relax. “But there are some questions which need to be answered.”
“Like?” Jazz prompted, obviously wanting this to be done so he could go back to spending time with his daughter.
“I think we have to ask why we keep getting these welfare calls about you and your daughter,” she continued seriously, meeting his gaze and holding it steadily. “Because we’ve sent agents out here multiple times, and found nothing. Do you know why people might be phoning in these calls on you? Any enemies who might want to unsettle you? Any neighbors with an axe to grind?”
“I’m pretty sure it’s the neighbors,” he sighed, running a hand over his head. “I don’t know how they found out, but…”
He hesitated for a long moment before he continued, and I found myself leaning forward, keen to hear what would come out of his mouth next. Was this to do with the criminal charges?
“They know that I’m involved with the Desert Marauders,” he finally breathed out. The name didn’t mean anything to me, but Amanda’s eyebrows vanished beneath her bangs as the words came out of his mouth.
“The motorcycle gang?” she clarified, and he nodded.
“How would they know that? And how does it affect them?”
“I think they think it’s means I’m bad news,” he went on. “Even though we’re not involved with anything…illegal. Or particularly dangerous.”
“And you think this is why they’re calling in these checks on your daughter?” Amanda made a note of something on her clipboard, and Jazz nodded again.
“I think so.”
“Do you think that had something to do with Ella getting hurt?” I blurted out before I could stop myself. I needed an explanation for that before I could trust this guy.
“I’m looking into it best I can.” Jazz glanced up at me. “I found footprints in the kitchen after she climbed out of the window. Man-size, not mine. I think whoever it was must have had something to do with it.”
“Really?” I leaned in. I wanted to believe him, but there was that little skeptical part of my brain that just wouldn’t let me without something more concrete to hang this all on. He fumbled in his pocket for his phone, tapped on the screen, and pulled up some pictures. He held his cell out to me, and I took it.
The picture showed his kitchen floor, the one beneath our very feet at that moment, with two large, smudged footprints bang in the center.
“Why didn’t you call the police?” Amanda asked, and he shook his head.
>
“They don’t tend to be very responsive to guys like me,” he said, shrugging. “They would probably have just assumed that I had hurt Ella and set this up to hide it, or one of my guys had done the same.”
“Your guys?” I wondered aloud.
“From the club.”
“And you’re certain it wasn’t any of them?” Amanda pressed. He met her gaze steadily, and I could tell he was pretty mad at even the implication.
“I’m totally sure.”
That was all I needed to hear—the conviction in his voice came off of him in waves.
“Well, thank you for your time today.” Amanda got to her feet, and shook his hand once again. “We’ll come back to collect copies of those pictures to put with your report, and we’ll be in touch if we need anything else.”
“Thanks.” He bowed his head, clearly glad it was all over. He glanced at me, and I felt a flutter in my chest. I wasn’t ready to be done with this guy—not quite yet, at any rate. He caught me by the arm, gently, and pulled me close, close enough that I could smell the shampoo from his still-wet hair. I stared at him, my eyes flicking down to his lips, and wondered for a crazy second if he was going to kiss me.
“I’ll call you about more babysitting, yeah?” He raised his eyebrows, and I nodded. I glanced over at Amanda, silently asking if this was okay.
“I actually think it’ll be good for you.” She clasped her hands together. “Not to mention for Ella’s recovering after the…incident.”
Phew. Okay. Heartbeat returning to normal, even if my brain was a little disappointed. I headed for the door, and back out on the street—back to reality, back to my own shitty little apartment, and back to a life without smoking-hot single dads who ran motorcycle clubs.
Chapter Six
It was incredible how quickly you could adapt to something new.
I had thought that anything that took me away from Ella would change my life for the worse, but it turned out that Mona only made it better.
She was amazing with my daughter—there was no doubt about that. She didn’t try and play mommy, but instead just reached out to her as a companion. I knew Ella adored her. She had never said as much to me, but it was clear from her excitement every time Mona appeared at the door, and her quiet little pout when it was time for her to go. I took it personally the first couple of times, but I began to relax when I saw what an amazing impact Mona was having on her life. And mine.
Yeah, sometimes I wished she would absentmindedly wander downstairs in her nightshirt a few more times, but I had to do my best to keep those thoughts out of my head for the sake of my daughter. It was nice having a woman around the house though, no doubt—not to do all the womanly shit like cook and clean, but just to have some female energy that came from somewhere other than my own daughter. I spent so much time around dudes with the club that it was good to get away from that once in a while and enjoy the company of someone who didn’t base their masculinity on the size and loudness of their bike.
Not that Mona and I saw a lot of each other; she stayed over maybe four nights a week, and I would stay out as long as the club would allow me each evening. I would return to the house, make us both a coffee, and enjoy some adult conversation before Ella got up and I got her ready for school. Mona would go out to work, I would catch some sleep, and Ella would head off to school. We felt like a little family.
I knew it was dangerous. I would have been stupid not to see it. The last time I played happy families, it blew up in my face in the most dramatic way possible. Even just thinking about putting myself and Ella through that bullshit again was scary, but goddammit, I couldn’t argue with the fact that it felt right to have someone filling in the mother-adjacent role in this house. And Mona seemed to enjoy it, too—even if she and I were missing out on the most fun parts of the arrangement.
One morning, I came into the house later than I normally did—morning had already broken by the time I crept through the door, and Mona was already making up a pot of coffee when I walked in.
“Morning.” She turned to me, eyebrows raised. “I missed you when I came down.”
I eyed her for a second, and she quickly corrected herself.
“Missed the coffee, that is,” she jumped in, flushing slightly. I made my way across the room towards her, dumping my helmet on the table as I went. I peeled off my jacket and collapsed onto one of the bar stools around the counter, letting out a small sigh of relief.
“God, it feels good to be back,” I murmured, half to myself. “Thanks for staying over again.”
“Hey, as long as you’re paying me.” She shrugged. I felt a little stab to the gut—even though I knew it was stupid, I had kind of hoped she would have been doing this no matter what the paycheck was. She didn’t seem to notice the little flicker of doubt on my face, and carried on making herself her coffee. She handed me a cup—made perfectly, as though she’d been watching like a hawk all those times I’d made it in front of her in the last few weeks—and leaned up against the counter.
“So, get up to anything interesting last night?” she asked brightly, and I had to stifle a yawn—I was so just freaking exhausted.
“I was just spending some time with the club,” I replied. “Getting our jobs in order for the next few weeks, you know.”
“What kind of jobs do you do?” She leaned forward excitedly. “Are they dangerous?”
“Not really.” I shook my head. “Just body-guarding, that kind of thing. It’s pretty banal but it pays the bills for most of the guys there.”
“Oh, right.” Her face fell a little bit, as though she had been hoping for some insane tales of derring-do. “I guess I just thought…”
“Yeah, I hate to break it to you, but motorcycle club stuff isn’t exactly the way they show it on TV,” I teased gently. “Seriously, I’m not some kind of criminal living outside the law or some shit. It’s just what I do.”
“I guess I thought any job that required you to stay out all night must be pretty exciting,” she remarked, peering at me over the top of her coffee cup. Those eyes—I could get used to waking up to those every morning. The piercing blue-grey of her irises sparkled in the morning light, and I couldn’t help but smile at her.
“So, how was Ella last night?” I asked, changing the topic before I leaned over to kiss her. My coffee breath was nothing to be scoffed at, and anyway, I didn’t want to mess up whatever it was we had here by making it uncomfortable for her. As far as she was concerned, she was just doing a favor for a single dad because she loved kids. There was no reason for her to think there was anything more to this, and I certainly wasn’t going to press the issue.
“She was great.” Mona smiled fondly. “It’s weird, I’ve never spent this much time around one kid before. Not even my family.”
“Really?” I furrowed my brow at her. “Maybe it’s just my family, but I don’t know how on Earth that’s possible.”
She shook her head with a small laugh. “I know, no one can believe that I didn’t grow up around kids, especially considering what I do for a living,” she commented. “But…I just didn’t.”
“So how did you get into this line of work, then?”
“I wanted to help people, I guess.” She glanced down at the coffee in her cup, as though trying to come up with a satisfactory answer. “But being around Ella…it makes me see why people love kids as much as they do.”
“She’s a little charmer,” I agreed. “But not all of them are like that. She’s special.”
“Oh yeah, and what father wouldn’t say that about his daughter?” she pointed out teasingly. I opened my mouth to protest, but she held her hand up before I could. “I know, though. She really is just so precious. You should be very proud of her.”
“I am.” I grinned. And then, there she was—at the top of the stairs, rubbing her eyes and heading down the steps in a slightly wobbly fashion.
“Hey, baby!” I placed my coffee cup down and hurried over to greet her as she reached the
bottom of the stairs. “Time to get ready for school!”
And so, the day kicked off again—me dropping Ella off down the road and watching as she made her way to her little cluster of friends and then into her classroom, then driving back home to catch some shut-eye. When I came through the door, I pulled off my jacket, my shirt, and my boots, and made for the stairs.
“Oh! Uh…”
I turned around, and found Mona standing next to the kitchen counter, frozen. Shit. What was it with us and accidentally getting half-naked in front of each other?
“Shit, sorry,” I apologized, reaching for my clothes. “I was just going to bed.”
“No, no, I’m sorry, I should have been out by now.” She let her eyes linger on my body for a second, before averting them towards the ground in front of her feet. “I was just making a few calls. I’ll go now.”
